Journalist, entrepreneur and marketing firm founder. I write about higher ed and early career issues. Pithily. I was pontificating about Millennials and Millennial culture back when they were still known as Gen Y.

7/22/2013 @ 9:00AM1,739 views

Why Paying For PR Help Is A Waste Of Money

Recently, I sat down with a young startup founder whose company was aiming at the Millennial market. One of the questions he had was about whether or not he should be hiring a PR pro to get his company some early media coverage. I convinced him to keep his company’s limited cash and instead think about what he was actually hoping to gain from media exposure and whether his startup was in a position to be able to take advantage of it at their current stage of growth.

If you want to get a segment on Good Morning America where you get to bake mini cupcakes – recipe from your new cookbook that veganizes the contents of the Atlanta Junior League’s recipe sampler from 1971 - with George Stephanopolous, by all means invest in (or have your publisher invest in) a publicist who can make that happen. But if you’re a startup? A small business? Or a cash-strapped not-for-profit? You can and should be approaching the press directly. Here’s what you need to know to do media relations on shoestring:

Know that not all publicity is created equal

What publications do your customers subscribe to? Where do they get their news and information online and off? What websites do they visit? If you can’t answer these questions, you shouldn’t be courting press attention and you certainly should be paying someone to score it for you. Getting a mention in The Wall Street Journal sounds great, but if your target market is more likely to be found hanging out at reddit, it doesn’t do you much practical good beyond giving your mom something notable to include in the family’s Christmas newsletter. There are the outlets that people who have money to give you are interested in and then there’s everything else. Understand the difference.

Understand your stories

Starting a business isn’t newsworthy. Writing a book isn’t newsworthy. Unless you’re Apple, launching a new product probably isn’t that newsworthy either. You need a hook. What’s interesting about your company or organization? Is it the founders and their career trajectories? Is it the topical nature of the work you’re doing and who it affects? Are you bringing new technology to a staid industry? Figure out what makes you stand out and use that as the basis of your bid for media coverage. And if you can’t find anything particularly noteworthy about your current status, it’s time to make some news. For example, when travel crowdsourcing site FlightFox wanted to get their name out, they challenged their participating travel agents to compete to see who could come up with the cheapest price for a trip around the world – it was a novel undertaking that piqued the interest of publications catering to both business travelers and vacationers and FlightFox dreamed it up and carried it out in-house.

Take the MVP approach to pitching

Who says you need a formal press release? Very rarely do journalists and editors award style points. Having your pitch come from a PR pro vs. your personal email isn’t more likely to impress the recipient or get you noticed. Media decision makers want interesting stories, unique applications of information or creativity and topics that will appeal to their specific readers. Instead of outsourcing to an agency or spending hours crafting a formal pitch to a journalist, think about reaching out to a reporter on Twitter to sound them out on your potential story in 140 characters or less. Borrow a page from the Lean Startup world (where I first heard this idea) and skip the formal PR proclamation and send a one or two sentence email – a minimum viable product of a pitch – instead. At worst, you get the same radio silence you would have gotten with a press release, but have saved the time, energy and expense of creating one. At best, the journalist replies with real-time feedback (an expression of interest or a pass) and you either get to open a discussion around your idea or you know to move on to the next reporter in your sights and consider what tweaks to make to your approach.

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Wow, great advice for a start up looking to get exposure for their company. I am a media pitch coach and spend a great deal of time working with smaller clients in similar circumstances. In many instances having to do their own PR is a blessing. Small businesses know how their product is different from others out there and know why it is newsworthy(if it is) and how to explain it. Who better than them to show the media how this is a story in that sweet spot of being slightly different, yet in the ballpark of what their audience is looking for. I have seen cases where a company could not afford press release distribution costs, and was forced into sending targeted, focused email pitches, only to discover this was the secret to getting real coverage. OK, thanks, Edward Smith.

I love the idea about creating news. I run an online marketing firm and it’s the type of thing I think about with all of our clients. Something newsworthy can generate more high quality incoming links than a year building them through traditional means.

I definitely agree with your last point, Jennifer. Bloggers and journalist are more open to employees of a business pitching them a story than a PR pro. The industry is changing though and soon the RIGHT kind of public relations pro will be a necessity for companies if they want to get on the right track. While your points above are true regarding the typical PR agency, I believe hiring a PR pro that can wear many hats in the organization is key to a companies success. This reinvented PR pro should have the ability to create and optimize content online, manage social media, initiate relationships with key influencers and news sites, and the list goes on. While start ups might not have the money to hire on a separate PR person, they should search for someone who has knowledge of public relations and can give them valuable advice during their first few years.